Catechesis. 4. To hope is to dig. The Empress Helena

Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!

Welcome to all of you, pilgrims who have come to Rome from many different places. In this city, rich in history, we can be confirmed in faith, charity and hope. Today we will look at a particular aspect of hope.

I would like to begin with a memory: as children, putting our hands in the soil had a special appeal. We remember it, and perhaps we still observe it: it is good for us to watch children play! Digging in the earth, breaking the hard crust of the world and seeing what is underneath…

What Jesus describes in the parable of the treasure in the field (cf. Mt 13:44) is no longer a children’s game, yet the joy of the surprise is the same. And the Lord tells us: this is what the Kingdom of God is like. Hope is rekindled when we dig and break through the crust of reality, going beneath the surface.

Today I would like to remind you that, as soon as they had the freedom to live publicly as Christians, Jesus’ disciples began to dig, especially in the places of his passion, death and resurrection. The Eastern and Western traditions remember Flavia Julia Helena, mother of the Emperor Constantine, as the soul of those searches. A woman who seeks. A woman who digs. The treasure that kindles hope is in fact the life of Jesus: we must follow in his footsteps.

How many other things an empress could have done! What noble places she might have preferred to peripheral Jerusalem! How many pleasures and honours of the court! We too, sisters and brothers, can settle into the positions we have reached and the wealth, great or small, that give us security. In this way, one loses the joy we had as children, that desire to dig and to invent that makes every day new. “To invent”, you know, means “to find” in Latin. Helena’s great “invention” was the rediscovery of the Holy Cross. Here is the hidden treasure for which to sell everything! The Cross of Jesus is the greatest discovery of life, the value that modifies all values.

Helena was able to understand, perhaps, because she had long carried her own cross. She was not born to the court: it is said that she was an innkeeper of humble origins, with whom the future Emperor Constantius fell in love. He married her, but for motives of power he did not hesitate to repudiate her, separating her from her son Constantine for years. Once he became emperor, Constantine himself caused her no shortage of pain and disappointment, but Helena always remained true to herself: a woman in search. She had decided to become a Christian and always practised charity, never forgetting the humble people from whom she herself came.

Such dignity and fidelity to conscience, dear brothers and sisters, change the world even today: they bring us closer to the treasure, like the work of the farmer. Cultivating one’s heart requires effort. It is the greatest work. But by digging, we find it; by stooping, we come closer and closer to that Lord who divested himself to become like us. His Cross is beneath the crust of our earth.

We can walk proudly, distractedly trampling the earth beneath our feet. If instead we become like children, we will know another Kingdom, another strength. God is always beneath us, in order to lift us up high.

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Special greetings:

I greet all the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors taking part in today’s Audience, particularly the groups from Uganda and the United States of America.  I pray that this Jubilee may be a time of spiritual renewal, rekindling our hope for the forgiveness of our sins, for the help of God’s grace and for life everlasting.  Upon all of you and your families, I invoke the strength and peace of Jesus Christ.  God bless you!

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Summary of the Holy Father's words:

Dear brothers and sisters, today we reflected more deeply on the gift of hope. Like children digging in the earth, we are called to dig beneath the surface of life with curiosity and trust to discover the hidden treasure of God’s Kingdom. Once freed from persecution, the early Christians began to excavate the land in places connected to Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection. Among them was the mother of Emperor Constantine, Empress Helena, who, motivated by her humble faith, found Jesus’ cross in Jerusalem. Let us imitate her example by rekindling in our hearts the desire to clear away hardness and pride, uncovering the greatest treasure of all: friendship with the Lord Jesus.

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Holy See Press Office Bulletin, 6 Settembre 2025